Eyes were locked, and hearts were being pounded beneath their enclosures. Her hands were still in the grip of her two little soldiers, and she couldn't wait to hear their answers in whatever way it is they could. She didn't know the time they had spent with their eyes locked until Meeno moved towards her and tapped her shoulder.

"Be patient, Aisha. His mother is with you, don't act up please." She hushed into her ears and the moment Ummi's eyes fell from his face, they landed on their entwined hands. Laila had now made an appearance into the room, and she had her eyes fixed unshaken on the two bundles of joy.

Arwa smiled at Ummi and walked towards her, "You did a great job, Ummi. Congratulations," she said, as she side hugged her and pinched both their cheeks.

Ummi could feel it, they were doing all they can to put a knife into the stomach of this awkwardness, because they knew what Al-amin had done from the looks Ummi and Maami herself were flashing him.

"Thank you, Ya Arwa. How's my boy doing?" Ummi asked casually and lay back on the bed, handing Meeno and Arwa the babies. She was too exhausted to give this a thought, too exhausted to let this sink into her, too exhausted to conclude about what she wanted and why she wanted it.

"Are you staying there, forever?" Maami growled at Al-amin that was still standing by the room, shooting him a look that made his intestines churned. He knew he had taken a turn to the bitter side of her, and it wouldn't be easy on him.

Slowly, their hands peeled off from each others' and they made their ways to the bed where Ummi had her eyes closed, but they all knew she wasn't sleeping. Al-amin looked at Ya Husna and felt he had no words to say to her. Is he going to act casually as if nothing had happened? Even if no one of them said something, he knew something had happened. He was the one that did it after all.

"Good morning, Ya Husna," he greeted, smiling nervously. He had been avoiding an eye contact with Maami, lest he lost his mind.

"Good morning, Al-amin, congratulations on your babies." She was smiling at him as if she wasn't pained about what he had been doing to her little sister and how he was not there for her when she was at the phase she needed him the most in her life. He felt disgusted of himself.

As much as he was eager to set his eyes on his kids, he had to stay rooted there and said his pleasantries with all the people present in the room. The knowing and disappointed look Meeno flashed him made him cringed to his skin. Maami didn't looked at him when he greeted her, and she did the same to Laila. He knew he was in for it. Laila excused herself and went out to make a call. Al-amin got suspicious of whom she was to call.

On his rescue, as Ibrahim always did, he moved close to Maami and whispered into her ears, "Maami, he needs sometime alone with her, should we excuse them?" Softly, as though afraid she would lit up a volcano the moment she spoke.

Maami hardly spoke, but whenever she was angry, they all knew not to get on her bad terms. He was acting all soft on her as if she was one of the new babies laying peacefully on their cribs.

"What is he going to tell her? What time alone do they want to have? Get out of my sight, Ibrahim, before I lose it on you." She was furiously tapping her right feet on the hospital floor, her eyes fixed on Ummi's babies and herself, guarding her for whatever it is that was to intrude in their lives again.

"Maami please, just for five minutes and I'll tell him to make it snappy, please, Maami." He begged, he wasn't going to give up just yet. He could see that Al-amin was at the verge of bursting into tears, and he couldn't let that happen when he was in the midst of his inlaws and his wife's friend. Even Arwa isn't in the right place to see his broken side.

Maami looked at him, then at Al-amin before she hissed softly and walked out of the room. They all wanted to leave too, so before anyone asked them to; they all slipped out of the room. Al-amin flashed Ibrahim an appreciative look as he closed the door for them.

Crest fallen, Al-amin walked towards the babies crib and he stood there watching as they slept peacefully. He felt tears pooling the brink of his eyes, and he broke into tears as if he was being told Maami was no more. He knelt beside the crib and hugged the plastic legs to his chest, crying profusely.

"I'm sorry," he cried, feeling the way his chest was squeezing with pain. If only he could turn back the hands of time, Ummi would have given birth when she was being seen under his eyes. What had he done to the woman that loved him? Could she ever forgive him?

It took him sometime before he sobered up and looked at the first baby, he scooped him into his hand and brought the boy close to his chest. Al-amin tumbled and almost fell when he slumped on Ummi's bed. He couldn't believe what he held into his hands, his child. It's nothing but what Ummi had groomed in her womb and now he could call it his child. His baby. He cried even more.

With the first child into his hands, he scooped the second and he had never felt this wobbly all his life. He felt like he was flying in the clouds and had the chance to feel the texture of the moon. He brought them all to his chest and cried harder than he had ever cried in his life. It was more painful now that he felt the skin of his boys, and knew he would never love anything more than he had ever loved them.

With the babies cradled on both hands, Al-amin softly tapped Ummi's frail fingers and whimpered, "Ummi...please..." the words trailed off, not having the right words to use. What would he say to her? I'm sorry would never be enough for the pain he had inflicted in her heart. She had endured more than what a wife should endure from him.

She felt him, she had heard him ever since she closed her eyes. She was wide awake but had her eyes closed. What was she going to tell him? What was she going to answer him with? Which layer of her eyes would she unveil before looking at him? What if she didn't want to see him? Not just now, tomorrow, a week after, in months to come, years, what if she didn't want to see him forever?

"I know you can hear him, I know you're not sleeping. Aysha, I don't know the right words to use to apologize to you, please Aysha, open your eyes." He kept choking on his words, crying like he had never cried before, his babies still cradled in his arms.

She was silent still, but tears managed to spill forcefully through the slits of her eyes, falling vertically onto her pillow. She felt sorry for him, because she knew the decision she would take would forever not be fair to her, to him and their kids. But she had to do this, for herself, and the up bring of her kids. She couldn't want to nurture her kids with a mental illness of always seeing their mother in pain, and that would make them hate their father wholly. It had happened, not only in the books she read, but in reality. She didn't want that for her kids.

"Even if you won't open your eyes for me, I know you hate me now, don't you? Open your eyes and tell me the names you would love to have for our kids, we have never had the chance to talk about names." It pained to reminisce that he didn't know of the pregnancy until she was six months along. What had he known about the kids?

He fixed his eyes on her, and she slowly began opening her eyes. Her eyes directly fell on him and she wanted to scream when she saw him holding their babies. What she had in mind would never be fair for any of them, but it's still the best. She fixed her eyes on him too and waited for him to speak first, her tears a fountain on her cheeks.

"What do you want me to name them? Do you have any name in mind?" He asked again, not taking his eyes off her. He could see how she was crumbling within, terrified and afraid of her own thoughts. She looked as if she was stranded in between what's right and wrong.

She closed her eyes and that gave more room for her tears before she darted them open. "Fawad and Fahad, respectively." She crooked and fixed her gaze into the pure white ceiling. She watched as the fan was swirling very fast in the air and for a second, Ummi thought what would happen if she were that fan?

That meant no tears for her, no pain and no heartbreak, no rules, for she would be moving faster for any of these to get to her. But if she was a fan, that meant she wouldn't have met Al-amin, she wouldn't have tasted what love felt like, its bittersweet taste. She wouldn't have had Meeno in her life, unless Meeno was going to be a fan as well. Most importantly, she wouldn't have had Fawad and Fahad in her life. Thinking about her babies, she made that thought vanished in her mind. It wasn't worth it.

She heard his moves on the bed, emanating he was praying in one of the boy's ear. That had always been her dream, to see the day Al-amin will hold their kid and say the iqamah to him or her. Albeit she didn't wanted to, she couldn't resist the urge to turn her eyes to take a look at them. He was saying it, right inside the right ear of Fawad, and more tears gushed down her cheeks.

He finished and said it to Fahad as well, before he smiled ruefully and handed Fawad to her, as he held Fahad firmly. They had never had this conversation, they didn't knew he was so good in holding infants until today, and she found it more amusing than he was a great chef.

She held Fawad into her arms, by now, she was seated upright with the help of a pillow on her back, which she didn't let Al-amin helped her with. To her, since she had endured the excruciating and soul taking pain of giving birth alone, what's there he could help her with that she couldn't do it for herself.

"Isn't it time to feed them, yet?" He asked casually, as though they were those lovely couple they had always dreamt of being. But what do they have to do when destiny and fate wanted sometime less for them?

She choose to tag along, even if it were for the hours left for them as a couple that just had their first children. She smiled ruefully at him and shook her head, "I'm lucky they aren't much of criers, it would've been hard on me. I pray they stick to the good habit though. About time for feeding them, I'm just a new Mommy that know nothing of the do's and don'ts, Maami have to guide me for now. You won't give Ammi much trouble, would you?" She peaked her face and took a glimpse of Fawad's face, whom was sleeping peacefully; yet cutely.

He didn't ignored the fact that she had been isolating herself and their kids from him. She made it sounded as if he wouldn't be part of their lives starting from the second day of their lives on earth. She was making him nauseous, making him cringed to his skin. This was no good at all.

"Should we feed them now? It's been hours since they arrived, right?" He knew it, he had no shame to ask the time they were born, and it made him felt guilty.

Slowly, a smile graced their lips. She was doing this all because it would be the last time they would have a decent conversation. Even though she was stranded, in the vast forest of her thoughts, unable to choose between what is right and wrong. She would like to have the most peaceful and lovely ending with him.

"Fawad was born at 10:55am and Fahad at 11:02am. Did you realise it? Today is your birthday. You have the same birthday as them, 16th November. Yes, we should feed them together." She smiled at him, even though painfully and ruefully, she did.

Al-amin wanted to talk, but he knew his words would mean nothing to her now. He could see how determined she was about whatever it is the decision she had made, and she wouldn't back out for just any flimsy excuse. He smiled at her and moved towards the bedhead where she was resting.

"You should do me the favour please," she whispered slowly, knowing it was exactly what he wanted to do. Why not let him when it might be the last he could see her smile not to talk of her boobs?

He looked at her hesitatingly and brought out her right breast, Fawad was already by her right side; he slid it into his lips. She winced and he did the same for Fahad, but Fahad was still in his hands, he had brought him close enough to her left breast.

"Is it paining?" He asked, looking at how she kept wincing silently and nibbling on her lower lip.

"Yes, everything for them hurts. Even the love I have for them hurts as much as a painful heartbreak would. And I'm willing to do everything for them, even if I were to deprive myself of what I love the most." She looked at him directly in the eyes as she uttered those words, and Al-amin knew she was telling him something more than just her love towards their boys. It was an enshrouded message, not for him; he prayed.

"They should be done by now, right?" He asked her, seeing how they almost spent thirty minutes in an eerily silence, which was killing him.

"Yes, I think they are." And the boys were carefully taken back to the crib by Al-amin.

He came back to the bed and what he did next took Ummi by surprise, she didn't know he would have the liver. He hugged her as silently and painfully as two hearts suffering from love would, and when he broke their hug, he placed down his lips on her forehead and pecked her.

"Thank you so much, Arub. Thank you for giving them life and healthily bringing them to this world. Thank you for being healthy and alive as well, I love you." He whispered and placed his forehead on hers. Ummi slowly placed her hand on his chest and felt the erratic beat of his heart. Even though she could feel the rhythm of his heart, she made her decision and it wouldn't be changed. At least, for her boys.

Welcome back,
Let's walk together with Ummi and Al-amin on their painful path of love.

Ayshatou.